What did you do this weekend?
After a date night with my wife on Friday night, the good times kept rolling on Saturday morning with a day-date with my daughter, Avery Kate.
Our phones were put away, and we had hours before it was time to head off to my son’s baseball tournament.
We leisurely drove to downtown Alpharetta for a late breakfast, then a walk around the town, before landing at All Fired Up to paint pottery.
It was just me and her hanging out– me listening to my future-thinking, highly relational, and energetic daughter talk about the people in her world and the future she envisions.
I learned so much more about her, me, and what is still to come. (I’m still very firm that she can’t date one-on-one until she’s out of college. I know this won’t last but it’s worth a shot.)
The world around us may want to have us focus our time and attention on what we can’t control, so we are tempted to be glued to the media sources, but this kind of quality time helps me keep perspective, stay true to what’s most important to me and continue on with what matters.
In the midst of economic, market, pandemic, and political chaos and uncertainty, it becomes even more important to get back to quality time in the activities that matter and that you can control, and to be with the people that are most important to you.
There is a similar benefit in focusing on Quality that plays out in investing, too. Quality companies may at times go up or down with the rest of the chaotic market. They also may not go up or down as much as the rest of the market.
Sometimes there will be an explanation, and at other times there will not be explanation. This is true regardless of the media headlines trying to explain why the market is up or down at a given moment in time.
Owning financially healthy Quality companies is not a promise of outsized returns or loss avoidance. Rather, it can provide rationality, reasonableness, and confidence at the very least, when things can seem so unreasonable – at least in the short-term.
There will always be commentators and pundits who act like they are so smart with explanations about what is going to happen next in the market given the current political and economic environment. The reality is, no one knows.
What has held true is staying invested over the long-term through all uncertainties and economic cycles and owning Quality companies can provide investors with calm in the midst.
Own Quality companies for the long-term, and even more importantly, find a way to invest quality time in the people and activities that matter to you most.
Quote:
“Quality is not an act, it is a habit.” – Aristotle